Wednesday, February 10, 2010

What are we eating Wednesday? Lasagna

The first time I made lasagna was a few months into my marriage... and it was so much work that I avoided making it again for 4 years! I hated cooking the noodles and using ricotta cheese and eggs... the whole thing was a little gross to me. It took longer than it was worth in my opinion. My hubby loved it and wanted more... but it was so much work! I resorted to the frozen variety and only ate it on rare occasions because it was expensive for a dinner. All this changed when I discovered I could make no-boil, no-egg, no ricotta cheese lasagna! This recipe has been adjusted from about 10 others I found online...


Super Easy Lasagna
Ingredients:
ground beef/turkey
sliced mushrooms (optional)
spaghetti sauce of your choice
1/2 cup water
lasagna noodles
16 oz cottage cheese
shredded mozzarella cheese

Preheat oven to 350*.


In a skillet, cook the meat. When the meat is almost done cooking, add the mushrooms. Cook a few more minutes until mushrooms are tender.


Add spaghetti sauce and water to skillet.


In a baking dish layer meat sauce,


...noodles,


...cottage cheese


...and mozzarella.


I try to make 3 layers ending with cheese.


Cover with foil and bake for 30 min at 350*.


After 30 min, remove the foil and increase temperature to 400* for an additional 20 min.


Remove from oven and enjoy!

7 comments:

Kate said...

thanks for posting this Michelle - I used to hate making lasagna too until my Dad (who used to make it at our family restaurant) told me that he NEVER boiled the noodles first and made it pretty much the same way you do - when I make it, I'm always a little worried that it will be "soupy" (because it looks a little juicy), but the noodles soak it all up and it turns out PERFECTLY (and its A TON quicker!) Yay for Lasagna!!

Anonymous said...

I used to hate making lasagna, too, until I found that Bertolli (I think) makes amazing no-cook noodles that you find on the same aisle as the regular pastas. They're thin like homemade pasta and never chewy. Check them out!

Kelli said...

Yummmm! I, too, only ever made lasagna once (years ago) because it was too much work and too expensive. But I love lasagna, so I'm super excited to give this a try! I also love lasagna with spinach and other veggies in it, and I'm guessing it would be super easy to add those in during the mushroom stage. Yay!

Anonymous said...

I also love Lasagna!.....I haven't made it in about a year but I substitute the cottage cheese for cream cheese, it is soooooo good!
Candace

Kelli said...

I came back to look at the pictures, and you've totally made me crave lasagna! I'm definitely going to have to make some ASAP.

Kelli said...

So, I just had to come back a third time to say that we just finished eating this lasagna for dinner and... WOW!

1. It really is super easy to make!
2. It was really, really delicious!
3. My husband loved it so much that he said, "Babe, can you make lasagna every day?" Maybe not every day... but I bet we'll be eating it regularly! I told him he has your blog to thank for this. :)

Thanks again for the recipe!

Unknown said...

Hi Michelle,

I make a lasagna dish almost exactly like your recipe except I add a small onion diced up with the meat and I put grated parmesan cheese in the layers as well. It's so easy and very yummy! We are having lasagna tonight!

Lacey (I met you at Target a couple of weeks ago) :)